Skills vs. Attributes
Skills vs. Attributes
Imagine you are on a school field trip to a remote little town on the coast. The trip leader signals for the bus to stop next to a small cliff that overlooks the beach that lies below and reveals the ocean at sunset. You are instructed to go and explore, but that the bus leaves in 15 minutes. You find a small trail that leads a little further down the cliff and you are able to see more of the beach and reveals just how awesome the landscape is. You get caught up watching the waves for a little too long, and before you know it, 30 minutes has passed. You run back up the cliff side to where the bus was. The bus has left, taking your water bottle, your backpack, and your phone. You do not see anyone else around you, and the sun is quickly starting to vanish. What do you do?
Situations such as the one stated above are the high stress, uncertain situations that show everyone’s true colors and strip everyone down to what their default settings are. These “defaults” are what we would call attributes. Are you courageous and adaptable? Are you able to compartmentalize well because of your situational awareness? Or will your self-efficacy and discipline help you out?
Too many times, skills and attributes are put into the same category and are not looked at as separate possessions. The biggest difference between an attribute and a skill is that a skill is something that can be taught and measured. For example, everyone in my group is in the process of learning a backstroke to breaststroke cross-over turn. That is a skill. If we spend enough time on it, everyone will eventually get the hang of it, and will be able to complete it effectively in an IM race. On the other hand, I probably won’t be able to force everyone to effectively get back to a baseline after a difficult setback (aka make them more resilient). This could be something that someone either does not naturally have, or has never been put into a situation where they needed to express that attribute.
The perfect example of “skills vs attributes” in the form of a person is Tom Brady (Sorry, Seahawk fans). Obviously, Tom Brady has mastered skills that most quarterbacks will never be able to. This might include how to throw a perfectly timed ball to a certain spot to where only the receiver can catch it. If Brady relied on his skills and talent alone, he would have not gotten to where he was. The “it” factor that college and pro experts talk about really boils down to the arsenal of attributes that someone possesses. Brady has never been the fastest, strongest, or most athletic guy on the field or even at his position, but he has much better Situational Awareness than most quarterbacks. He can read defensive layouts, routes, blitzes. Etc. better than most (If not all) professional quarterbacks. Additionally, Brady has always been known to perform well in crunch time in high stress environments. He isn’t clutch; he has superb Compartmentalization skills that allow him to only focus on the information needed to complete a task or skill. To the outside eye it might look like a huge, 4th down completion in a championship game, but to him, it is a 3 step drop, a throw and catch during a play that he has run through thousands of times in practice and in games. Skills will never be able to be implemented correctly, especially in demanding environments, unless the attributes allow for that.
Attributes may lie dormant for years, but it does not mean they are not there; situations of uncertainty and high-stress make those attributes come to life. High- Stress environments are different for everyone. To some, speaking on a zoom call might bring on the same amount of stress as someone who is about to swim butterfly on repeat 50’s for multiple rounds of 8x50. Coach Tomas may not have always been patient, or even thought of himself as a patient person, but with the arrival of his first son, he might soon realize that he actually has always had patience. Some of us may have thought that we did not have great Learnability or did well when it came to adapting to drastic change, but then a worldwide pandemic changed the way we would operate for the foreseeable future without knowing when things would ever get back to normal, some of us ended doing more than okay. 2020, and through today, might have shown some us that we certainly can adapt to uncertain and harsh changes.
The bottom line is that we will never see what we are truly made of unless we get out of our comfort zone and challenge ourselves, or at least allow ourselves to be put in situations that allow us to be challenged. How will we know how resilient we are if we never put ourselves in a position to fail and learn from our experience? How will we know how much self efficacy we have if we never put ourselves in a position to go on a journey when we do not know how it will end? We must allow ourselves to be put in uncertain and high-stress environments to continue to grow physically and mentally.
Go SMAC!
Julian
